


Daily Grind

by K_dAzrael



Category: Batman Begins/Dark Knight
Genre: Alternate Universe, Humor, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-06
Updated: 2010-01-06
Packaged: 2017-10-05 22:01:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/46452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_dAzrael/pseuds/K_dAzrael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce Wayne has a best friend who's also his most troublesome employee. Nights out on the town can be hazardous for your health.</p><p>An AU where Martha and Thomas Wayne don't die, consequently Bruce doesn't become Batman and the Joker can't exist without his straight man.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_Martha Wayne unclipped her pearls and fed them back into their section of the jewelry box. Her young son frowned in puzzlement at her in the mirror._

"_But I thought we were going tonight... dad said so."_

"_I know he did, sweetheart, but your father has to work. They need him at the hospital – another surgeon called in sick. We can go to another night, I promise."_

_When the little boy looked troubled, she turned on the stool and gave him a reassuring smile. "There's nothing special about tonight, is there Bruce?"_

"_I guess not."_

* * *

Bruce Wayne waved in Coleman Reese with an airy gesture, the employee taking a seat and waiting patiently for the CEO to finish his phone call.

"Yeah, yeah, I saw those pictures from the gala..." a soft laugh. "No, she's just a friend, honestly!" A pause as Bruce listened to what the other person was saying. "Well, when I_ do_ I promise you you'll be the first to know." A roll of his eyes in Reese's direction. "Tonight? No, I told you, I have plans. I thought we agreed on Sunday? Ok, I'll come by the manor about six. See you Sunday. You too."

He replaced the phone in its cradle. "Sorry about that. My mother." Bruce leaned back in his leather executive chair. "So, what can I do for you Mr. Reese?"

The employee cleared his throat, looking nervous and uncertain. "It's about... it's about Mr. Kerr."

"Ah," a look of comprehension dawned on Bruce's face.

"I don't mean to criticise you or your choices, Mr. Wayne. I know he's a... a friend of yours."

"What's he done to offend you?"

"Well... he's disruptive. Not just to me, to everyone on the same floor as his office."

Bruce gave a small smile, privately amused. "Really? None of the secretaries have complained."

"Well, they all put up with it because they're either scared of him or they think he's... I don't know, charming."

"I take it you don't share that opinion?"

"Sorry sir, but no. He... he's loud, he's rude, he's threatening. And he... he steals things, breaks things..." Reese was gathering speed and confidence as he remembered the outrages: "he manages to set the fire alarms off at least twice a week! He changed the sign on the door so it says 'murders and executions' instead of 'mergers and acquisitions'! And... yesterday he threw his blackberry at me!" He brought himself back under a semblance of control again, yanking his tie in agitation. "I really am sorry. I hate to be a... 'tattle-tale', but I find his presence... highly disruptive."

"I see." Bruce put on an 'I'm taking all this very seriously' face. He suspected – despite Coleman Reese's front of studied obsequiousness – that this was the kind of person who would not hesitate to kick up a fuss if he felt sufficiently grieved or if he thought he was not being listened to. "Well, we'll see about moving you to an office on another floor. Is that acceptable?"

"Well, I... yes, I suppose."

"And, of course, I'll have another talk with Mr. Kerr about his behaviour." Bruce folded his hands together on the desk to signal that their interview had come to an end.

"Ok. Thanks for your time," Reese said, rising from his chair.

Bruce called to him as he was almost at the door, causing him to pause. "Mr. Reese... I don't want you to think it's about favouritism, or anything like that. It's all just business. Mr. Kerr is unpredictable, unorthodox – maybe even unscrupulous... but he brings a lot of revenue to this company."

"I understand," Reese replied, a hint of an unbecoming scowl about his bland features as he opened the door to let himself out. "Perfectly."

When he had gone Bruce sighed and picked up his phone, buzzing through to his secretary. "Anne, could you please page Mr. Kerr and ask him to drop by?"

* * *

As he waited for the troublesome employee to present himself, Bruce sat back in his chair and thought about him, wondering briefly why he kept the maniac around. He turned profits, certainly, but Bruce suspected that it was mainly just for entertainment value. He smirked, imagining the look on that twit Reese's face as he dodged a flying blackberry.

Bruce turned to his computer and brought up the employee records folder. After much research through both official and clandestine channels, it continued to frustrate him that he knew practically nothing about the person in question. Even the few details that he i_thought/i_ he knew about the man had come from the horse's mouth and therefore needed to be followed with the word 'allegedly'.

His name was Joseph Kerr (allegedly – Bruce has never seen a birth certificate and the man himself claimed not to know where he had been born or the last name of either of his parents). He had been orphaned as an adolescent (allegedly). He had then drifted around Chicago, Springfield and various other cities in the mid-West before making his way to Gotham (allegedly - none of the local police departments or social services in any of those cities had any files on him).

Somewhere along the way he had picked up a horrendous set of facial scars (the so called 'Glasgow smile' or 'Chelsea grin' commonly inflicted by street gangs). While the scars themselves were certainly genuine, Bruce had heard him tell at least five different stories about their precise origins.

As an adult he had worked for various mid-level business outfits (allegedly – all the references Bruce tried to chase up turned out to belong to businesses that had either disappeared beyond all tracing – he suspected mob links – or lost all their records in mysterious systems failures).

All that Bruce knew for certain was that an enigmatic figure who claimed to be called Joseph Kerr had somehow bypassed all his security in order to walk into his office and deliver such a deranged and compelling pitch that he felt compelled to hire him on the spot.

And he _was_ enigmatic – you had to give him that – and incredibly charming when he wanted to be. At other times playfully malicious or maliciously playful; frequently just plain mean. Ruthless and endlessly manipulative... and, of course, funny as all hell. Essentially he was selfish, shameless and opportunistic being – spending time with him was like walking around with a personification of your own id.

His call-sign in the hyper-masculine world of elite business was 'the Joker'. A contraction of his name (or maybe his 'real' name was just a cheesy expansion of his nickname?) and also a fitting description of his anarchic, malevolent and yet oddly puckish character. Instead of business cards he handed out jokers from playing decks: they had no contact details on them, the theory being that if for some reason you wanted to speak to him, you would get off your ass and find out his number for yourself. Although his usual _modus operandi _was to find _you_, whether you wanted him to or not.

Bruce heard his arrival long before he appeared. Despite being in her late thirties and married, Anne the secretary was laughing like a Japanese schoolgirl as he fed her charming nonsense. His personality was so magnetic that his scars and his bizarre sartorial affectations seemed to be no impediment to his ability to seduce – when whatever business at hand called for it.

His name for himself might be 'the Joker', and his male colleagues accepted it (with a mixture of envy, reverence and fear), but the female employees all called him 'the Blond Bombshell'. Bruce just prayed that J would never find that out, because on the day he did he would officially become so smug as to be insufferable.

Soon the prodigal himself burst through the doorway without knocking or waiting to be announced, all loose burnished-gold curls and a huge smile that seemed artificially lengthened by his scars. Today he had favoured an olive green pinstripe suit with a pale yellow shirt and a burnt sienna tie. It had no right to look good on him, but it did. He had broad shoulders, muscular arms and a narrow waist – the sort of male figure which wasn't fashionable anymore. The suit was of a similarly retro cut: the trousers high-waisted with pleated fronts, held up with suspenders. Only one button of his double-breasted jacket was done up, his hands bunching up the fabric because they were shoved into his trouser pockets. He crossed the room in three strides and threw himself down into the chair and propped his feet up on Bruce's desk.

"Hiiiii," he gave an apologetic grimace, pushing back the hair that had fallen across his forehead. "Were we supposed to have coffee this morning? I forgot. My organiser e-mail thing... got broke, uh, somehow."

"Perhaps because you threw it at Coleman Reese's head?" Bruce ventured, trying not to smile.

"Is he the one that looks like a wimpy ten year old kid? Yeeeeah, maybe. Can't say I exactly _re_-call."

"Look J, I'm not saying he didn't deserve it, but in future _don't_. I have to draw the line somewhere, and it's at physically assaulting other employees."

"I wasn't trying to hit him – that's the honest, _honest _truth – scout's honour! I was aiming for the wall, or maybe it was the _win_dow... What can I say, Brucey," a shrug and a twisting of his mouth. "I'm just sooo clumsy."

Bruce gave him an 'enough of your bullshit' look. "Go on, don't you have a merger to force?"

"Oh yeah!" he stood up and fumbled his phone out of the breast pocket of his suit. "let's see what those nice folks at Tel-star have to say to my... ulti-_ma_tum."

"Have fun. Oh and J, remember we're having dinner tonight. Eight o'clock, Dorsia."

"Yeah, I wrote it on my hand." J flipped his wrist to show off the illegible biro scrawl. "See ya, Brucey."

"Don't crash the stock market, J. And hey - how about tonight you wear something a little more... understated?"

"Me Brucey," he flipped open his jacket to show the carmine coloured silk lining, "I'm all about subtle."

* * *

Bruce entered the bar area of Dorsia at precisely eight to find his friend slouching on a stool, one elbow on the bar, the other holding a gimlet.

"Hi Brucey! I got you an oooold fashioned."

"Is that a cocktail or an insult?" Bruce sat down on the neighbouring stool and clapped the other man on the shoulder. "Have a good day? Make anyone cry or jump from a window in despair?"

"Not that I know of. Saaay, no classy floozies tonight?"

"No," Bruce smirked. "Just us."

"Bruce-o," J fixed him with an apparently serious look, leaning in confidentially, "is this... a daaate?"

"Ha," said the billionaire humourlessly, almost choking on the first sip of his drink.

"So, you like my suit? It's new." J gestured to a purple velvet affair that he had inexplicably chosen to match with a blue silk shirt and tie, and a green waistcoat.

"You look like the ghost of mardi gras. How much did that nightmare cost you?"

"Five grand." J rubbed the fabric of his lapel between a finger and thumb. "Hand-tailored."

"In a recession? You truly are shameless, aren't you?"

"Hey, this recession is like... uh, natural selection..." J began to pontificate. "Too many useless idiots in business, floundering in excess cash. A little thinning out is what is needed... survival of the fittest." He licked his lips. "Besides, money is like _water_... it doesn't disappear off the face of the planet, it just... moooves around."

"From other people to you, mainly."

J gave him a wounded look. "Aw, you know I don't give a shit about _money_."

Bruce laughed because, strangely, it was true. "You just like having the power to cause mayhem."

"We're all playing God, Bruce-o. You and your family, with all their _phil_-anthropy and their _programmes _and their _foundations_, building up the poor. Me... I'm pulling down the rich. It's all about..." he made an emphatic gesture, tapping the bar top with two fingers, "cosmic balance."

"Like Vishnu and Shiva," Bruce commented, almost to himself.

"Sure, I'll drink to that."

* * *

After dinner, paid for by Bruce, they went to one of the dive bars in the narrows favoured by J. Although Bruce liked to complain about J's bad taste in drinking dens, secretly he loved the seedy anonymity of the places they went. The smell of beer soaked into floorboards, of sawdust and cigarette smoke made him feel strangely free and relaxed after a lifetime of fine dining.

Despite the fact that they were two well-heeled men in the notoriously dangerous narrows, they rarely seemed to run into trouble. Something about J's scars and the look of glittering intelligence in his eyes tended to put off anyone who might have otherwise entertained a fleeting thought of harassing him. They probably assumed that he was some kind of well-to-do thug (true in its own way); a son of the mafia perhaps.

Bruce had no fears for his own personal safely: he was in good shape, of course, thanks to all the gym work and boxing. A dark, atavistic part of him welcomed the occasional drunken fight. It wanted the world to know that Bruce Wayne wasn't just some effete little rich boy, riding through life on his daddy's coat-tails: he was powerful, dangerous – and he could take care of himself.

He supposed that luring him into sleazy, dangerous situations was J's way of educating him, playing Virgil to his Dante.

He had once seen J with blood on his teeth, laughing as Bruce flexed his grazed knuckles after flooring an assailant. That was the first time he had realised that he wanted to kiss J.

Tonight they were in a bar called 'One-Eyed Jacks', sitting in a dark corner and drinking cheap whisky, the kind that tasted like a cross between burnt wood and antiseptic mouthwash.

"Jaaaaaaaay. Mister Jaaaaaay. You're my best friend, you know?" he slung his arm around his companion's broad shoulders.

J's laugh was like a machine-gun stutter in his ear. This close J smelled like sweat and cologne. Bruce wanted to bite him on the underside of his jaw, wanted to undo the buttons on his shirt and slide his hand inside, feel the hardness of his chest.

"Ye-ah, I know Brucey-babes, I know."

"But you don't _understand_." Bruce frowned, then waved a hand at nothing in particular. "Should I fire Coleman Reese, do you think?"

"Yeah," J agreed emphatically, tapping a forefinger on the table, "He's a little sneeeeak! Fire his ass! Do it right now!" He pick-pocketed Bruce's phone out of the inside of his jacket and held it in front of his face.

Bruce laughed and took it, flipping it open. Bruce scowled in drunken outrage as he squinted at his contacts list. "I don't have his number!"

"Uh-oooooh!" J covered Bruce's face with one hand.

"Hey quit it you asshole!" Bruce gave him a shove which had more force behind it than he meant.

"You're not the boss 'a me!"

"Yes I am. That's exactly what I am."

"I only let you think that."

"Pff," said Bruce laughing, but his rejoinder was forgotten when J's fist grasped hold of the front of his shirt and a forearm pinned him against the wall of the booth. J's face was suddenly very close, but Bruce was distracted from it by a quick glint of steel. The double-edged blade of a flick knife slipped between his faintly parted lips, lying flat against his tongue and pressing painfully against the left corner of his mouth.

"Shush-shush-shh," J said when he made a startled sound. "Don't struggle now, wouldn't want a... aha, a slip up.."

Bruce's dark, anxious eyes searched the face of his friend. J's eyes held no insanity or drunken glaze – they were shrewd and bright, as if all the alcohol he had consumed had only sharpened his sobriety.

"You're the boss, huh?" J repeated, his voice low, almost intimate. "Look, _look_, you're afraaaid – how can you be the boss of anyone? Hm?" His tongue did a slippery circuit around his red-bitten lips. "If you don't know what you _want_... how can you tell someone else what to do for you?"

Bruce made a brief effort to move, to shove J back so he could free his hands, but the other man held him fast.

"No, no no, don't struggle. I'm just trying to prove a point, Brucey. _Look at me_! Look what I can do to you in – in a moment. Hmm? I could give you scars, like mine, if I wanted to. You wanna know how I got them? Want to really know?"

Bruce swallowed, tasting metal, the blade just nicking the seam of his lips. He could feel a trickle of blood slide ticklishly down his chin.

"So I was this wimpy little kid, right? Nothing went right for me. Alcoholic dad, handy with his fists, pill-popping mommy, always _zombie_-fied or passed out. Bullied at school for being the poor boy with dime store clothing, right?" his eyes were wide and vulnerable now, as if pleading with Bruce to understand, but the arm against his chest was still forcing out his breath, the knife hand still steady. "And I was always _crying_. 'Boo hoo! Don't beat me up! I can't take the pain!'. Then one day – I was maybe... thirteen – I suddenly realised that nobody was ever going to _stop hitting me_ just because I _asked_ them nicely. No, no. The pain was always going to be there, I just had to be... _in_different to it. I had to turn that frown upside down!" his gaze burned into Bruce's. "Literally."

Bruce felt faint – he could see the punchline coming.

"It wasn't easy, not at first. I thought about taking some of mommy's pills to dull the pain but that would have been _cheating_, wouldn't it? So, shallow cuts at first... then more _con_fidence." The knife in Bruce's mouth twitched. "In the end I made myself a new face. It changes you, an experience like that..." he raised his eyebrows. "The pain, the fear, the _un_-certainty, it's all gone. And you can never go back... because nothing anyone else can do to you will _ever_ be as bad as what you know you can do to yourself."

The click of a button and the knife blade retracted, then a thumb swiped at the smear of blood on Bruce's chin and the young billionaire watched as J raised it to his mouth and sucked it clean.

"So now you know what you have to do if you really want to be... your own boss."

Bruce remained where he was for a moment, his chest heaving. He knew he must look stupid and wide-eyed. Then – just as suddenly as J had seized him – he seized J, pinning him back against the cracked leather of the seat, his fists buried in the silk of waistcoat and shirt. Without even thinking it or debating it with himself, he was _kissing_ J, attacking his mouth hungrily and stealing his breath. Shamelessly, like some mad, brute animal, he pressed his hip up against the other man's thigh and let him feel how _hard_ he was.

A moment later he pulled away, a fine string of bloody saliva connecting their mouths like a guideline for the briefest second before it broke and separated them. Bruce bunched his sweat-dampened hands in the fabric of his own trousers and stared at J, wondering what he would do. Maybe he would laugh. Maybe he would smack him one...

"Hey you goddamn faggots!" came a voice from across the bar. "Get a fucking room!"

J's head snapped around to stare at the speaker (a soused-looking burly biker-type with a beard and an oil and God-knows-what stained t-shirt) then back to Bruce.

"What did that rube fucking call us?" he hissed.

"I think he called us faggots," Bruce replied, almost absently. Everything was lost in a haze of alcohol and shock.

"He did?" J cracked his neck, slowly and deliberately. "Yeah, that's what I thought."

There was a crash as J pushed over the table and sprang up and over it.

_Game on._

* * *

Bruce leaned one grazed hand against the wall as he vomited copiously into the gutter. It turned out that lobster, cheap whisky and a punch to the gut were not a good combination.

J's voice came from somewhere behind him and to his left. "You know what I like about you Brucey? You're hard, you know? Tough. Even though you never had to be. Most guys with your upbringing, they'd be all doughy and, uh... genteel. But you, you're a scrapper. Probably wouldn't have mattered to you if you'd grown up on the streets... We're two of a kind, you and me."

Bruce coughed and spat out bile, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand before cautiously straightening up. When he took a step and stumbled, J grasped his arm and steadied him. His body seemed like the only reassuringly solid thing in the world, so Bruce leaned against it.

A hand ruffled his hair. "Alright kiddo, let's get you home." J's laugh rang out, echoing in the alley. "Little man you've had a busy day..."

* * *

Bruce woke up to a world of misery and sickness. Daylight hurt. Breathing hurt._Thinking_ hurt. Pain circumscribed his entire existence.

His mouth tasted like something had died in it and been entombed there for days.

He brought his hands up to his head in an attempt to stop his skull from exploding and gave a long, low groan of self-pity.

"Morning princess," came a familiar voice. "Gosh, no offense, but you really look like hell before you've put your face on in the mornings, hon."

Bruce thought of some choice things to say but he didn't know if his voice was working yet, and didn't want to give J an excuse to come over and shake him or tickle him or... agitate his fragile frame in any way, really, so he merely groaned again. "Uuungh."

"Yeah," said J thoughtfully. "Good point."

Bruce coughed and blinked his eyes open a fraction. He couldn't see J, so he assumed the voice must be coming from the kitchen, behind him from where he lay sprawled out on his own sofa. "Why aren't you hung-over, you bastard?"

"Hey, don't be mad at meeee just 'cause some of us can hold our drink." The voice was coming closer. A hand holding a mug appeared and deposited it on the coffee table, eye-level to supine Bruce. He could smell coffee and see inviting wafts of steam, but he wasn't ready to actually attempt to sit up in order to drink it.

J threw himself down into an armchair opposite, sticking his long legs out in front of him and crossing them at the ankles.

"So you stayed the night?" Bruce asked.

"Hmm. Didn't seem fair to leave you. Besides," he gave a luxurious stretch, "your bed is com-feee."

Bruce grinned. "You let me sleep on the sofa while you took the bed?"

"Hey, you were passed out. Wouldn't have made a difference to you whether it was a fluffy cloud or a bag of rocks."

Bruce glanced beneath the blanket to see he was in his boxers. "Did I at least undress myself?"

J laughed. "Uh, no."

"'Goddamn faggot'," said Bruce with a smirk.

"I hear it takes one to know one."

Bruce reddened. "Listen I'm sorry about that. I was _really_ drunk..."

J laughed, uproariously. "Ha ha! Bruce! You're amaaaazing! I pull a knife on you and you apologise to meee... for a little kiss? Ha-hee-hee!"

Bruce scowled. "Ok, let it go."

J got up and came over to peer at him, hunkering down and tilting his head to one side. "You're cute when you're embarrassed," he said, poking Bruce's forehead with one finger.

Bruce batted the hand away irritably. "Yeah, go on, get out of here. Aren't there other people in the world for you to torment?"

"Ok, I'm gooooing," J bounced up and almost took a step before a thoughtful look came over his features, like he had just remembered something. He crouched back down, smirking face looming once more in Bruce's line of sight. "And by the waaay... I _will_ fuck you. And it's going to be _glorious_." He straightened up again and added brightly: "but you know... when you're sober. So long, beautiful. See you Monday."

Bruce stared wildly after him as J sauntered through the door and slammed it, wondering if he had hallucinated the whole episode.

Eventually he managed to sit up and drink most of the black coffee. Then he stumbled through to his room and climbed into the bed. He smelled J's cologne on his pillows and it immediately conjured up the image of that loose-limbed body naked and luxuriating in the comfort of _his_ – Bruce's own – bed.

He groaned again, but this time it wasn't pain... his hand pressed against the front of his shorts as he remembered how J's chest had felt pressed up against his, the brief, hot, wet clash of their mouths.

Damn him.

One fine day Bruce was really going to fire him.

Monday was a long way away.


	2. Chapter 2

On what remained of Saturday Bruce lounged in bed until the worst of his hang-over had passed, unable to focus on anything except his memories of the previous evening and the resultant graphic fantasies about J.

The J of his imagination was naked and pliant and blissfully mute. Bruce slid his tongue deep into that split and jagged mouth as pale masculine thighs parted eagerly at his touch. He moaned and imagined his partner's answering moan as he slipped effortlessly into the heat and tightness of that willing body.

J had said 'glorious'. Yes, it would be...

Alone in his bed, Bruce worked himself feverishly with one hand, reaching orgasm twice before throwing back the covers in a fit of self-disgust and going to punish himself in his gym.

Later he went to buy groceries and returned to the penthouse to make himself dinner. He had fought hard for his independence – his mother had never really been happy about his insistence at moving out of the manor. Cooking for himself from time to time still filled him with a strange satisfaction. He reached for a chef's knife off the magnetic holder on the wall and began to chop a tomato into segments.

Maybe he should offer to cook for J? No, it would be stupid to try and romance the man as if he was a normal person. Such a gesture would undoubtedly earn Bruce derision.

"_By the way... I __**will **__fuck you."_

... As if it was a decision which Bruce didn't need to trouble himself with and J was just courteously informing him of the outcome.

Smug bastard.

* * *

On Sunday Bruce went to the manor for a family dinner. He kissed his mother, who was already waiting, and when his father arrived he jumped up to give him a clap-on-the-back hug.

"Good to see you, dad. How was your trip?"

Over the meal Martha talked about her foundations in Gotham, the problems they were having with the programme for the education of underprivileged children. Thomas talked about his most recent trip to Kenya with the Red Crossand the horrific things he had seen in a country torn apart by civil war. Bruce discussed his corporation's profits and where he was thinking of directing them, and informed them of the corruptions he had uncovered by scrutinizing the revenue streams of other companies.

"I hear you've got some kind of pit-bull working for you over there," his father said casually.

"Yeah, who told you that?"

"Oh I still have my contacts. I understand that this character calls himself 'the Joker', wears loud suits and talks like a mafioso. Some kind of.." Thomas passed his hand in front of his face, "facial scarring."

"Yeah," Bruce grinned. "I like to keep him around for meetings with my rivals. He scares the hell out of them."

Martha frowned. "Don't you think a character like that damages the company's reputation?"

"Well frankly... I'm just glad he works for _me _and not Luthercorpor somewhere like that. I like to keep him close so I know what he's doing... that way, at least I keep a hand on his collar."

"Be careful Bruce," his father warned. "From the stories I've heard he sounds dangerous. Unbalanced even."

"He's _not_ crazy, actually... that's just an act he puts on to throw people, to make them underestimate him. He's one of the most intelligent and in-control people I've ever met."

"Still," Thomas continued in his calm, authoritative voice, "make sure you don't let him get the better of you. You have a reputation to maintain."

Bruce glanced down at his own hand where it rested on the table cloth, noticing the faint grazing on his knuckles. He was struck by the sudden realisation of how little his parents really knew about him. They saw the good son, the worthy young man to whom they had given over Wayne Enterprises as a gesture of trust. They knew nothing of the Bruce that welcomed darkness, the Bruce that had let the Joker stick a blade in his mouth.

Thomas rose from the table. "I'm sorry, I should get going. I have to go back and get an early night. I've got to do a phone conference with the headquarters in Geneva really early in the morning. "

"Do you need a ride home, dad?"

"No, no – you stay here with your mother." Thomas Wayne made his way around the table, squeezing Bruce's shoulder on his way past and giving Martha a business-like kiss on the cheek.

"Bye Thomas," said Martha, her eyelashes dipping and her patrician features tautening almost imperceptibly. "See you in a few weeks."

"I'll walk you out," Bruce offered, rising from his chair.

When they were at the front door, his father turned to face him for a moment. "Listen, Bruce... it's not my place to say anything. But... maybe, if you could see your mother a little more. Just, you know, drop by. I don't want to pressure you, but I think she'd like that."

"Yeah, sure," Bruce replied, feeling resentment rising within himself for a moment before he repressed it. "I understand."

* * *

When Bruce tried the direct line to J's office on Monday and got only an obscene recorded message, he dialed back on the main line to get the secretary, a matronly woman named Shawanda with a coiled and laquered beehive of ebony-coloured braids, lethal-looking bejeweled fingernails and a face as impassive as an Easter Island statue. She treated J with a weary tolerance that he took to signal her undying love for him.

After speaking to her and confirming that J was indeed awol, Bruce tried dialing the last known number for his cellphone. Amazingly the call was even answered.

"Hiiiiii!"

"Your secretary says you haven't been in all day."

"Miss Moneypenny betrayed me, huh? Just for that I'm not going to ask her to marry me."

"I'm sure she'll be relieved. Where are you?"

"Brooks Brothers, shoe shopping. Jesus, some of these shoes are so boring you might even like them."

"Who do you think you are, Carrie Bradshaw? Get back to work before I fire you."

"Now Brucey, I think we both know that's not going to happen. Beeesides, it's one o'clock... I'm on my break now. Why don't you come downtown and have some lunch with me in Spinosa?"

"I can't just drop everything and waltz off for a long lunch."

"Why not? I thought, uh, I thought you're the _boss_. You said so."

"I have... meetings," Bruce grumbled, aware of how lame his words sounded.

An impatient sigh, as if J considered him dull-witted and deeply uninventive. "Then just delegate to Foxy Lucius. He can do his worldly-wise ooold man thing, and you can have... some fun."

"You actually can't even imagine doing something that you don't _feel like_ doing, can you?" Bruce observed. "Some of us have responsibilities, you know."

Another laden sigh and then a dial tone as J hung up, leaving Bruce feeling infuriated beyond all reason.

* * *

Bruce entered Spinosa to find J sitting at a table near the window with a glass of white wine and a plate of snails dressed in oil and herbs sitting before him. He looked up, chewing with his mouth open. "Oh you made it, I'm so _thrilled_!"

When Bruce sat down opposite he hooked a cooked snail out of its shell with a pick and held it out to him. "These little guys live on fennel fronds. Makes 'em taste like aniseed."

Bruce dutifully ate the proffered morsel and signaled for a waiter to bring him a menu.

"Sooo, is this really the first time you've ever... played hooky?"

"Yeah, you're a bad influence."

"And you like being... led astray." J commented as he mercilessly devoured another mollusc. "So, why were you looking for me? Any reason in par-ticular, or did you just miss my sweet, uh, face?"

"It worries me when I don't know where you are."

"Aww, why I'm touched."

"It worries me because I suspect you're up to no good somewhere or slacking off."

"Hey!" J gestured with his wine glass. "I staged two hostile take-overs before breakfast today so, you know, I've earned my keep like a good doggy." He leaned forward, adopting the tritely philosophical tone of a self-help book: "it's all about... being _smarter_, not working longer."

"You're wasted in your department – I should make you head of motivational speaking."

"Ooh, I'd like thaaat!"

"Creating your own unholy army of anarchist financiers? I bet you would."

"Worried I might... mutiny? Found a bigger and better company? Buy and sell _yooou_?"

Bruce did not rise to the threat, continuing to peruse his menu. "What for? You'd get bored. You'd have to go to your own damn meetings."

J slurped his wine and laughed.

* * *

On Wednesday Bruce decided to call in to J's office to arrange plans for the weekend. Shawanda assured him (with an eloquently disapproving eye roll) that the menace himself was indeed actually in his lair; however, when Bruce entered he found himself in a room that was seemingly empty.

Many abandoned coffee mugs were scattered about and all available surface space was covered in computer print out and old newspapers. There were signs of recent occupation: a television on top of a filing cabinet showed flickering pictures of the rolling bulletins on a twenty-four hour news channel and a white blazer with blue stripes hung on the back of the office chair. Bruce was still standing in the centre of the room and gazing around, wondering if J would hide in the closet for some reason, when the window slid open and J stepped off the outer ledge and onto his own desk, then hopped down onto the floor.

"Well, well, this is an _un_expected pleasure," he purred as he crossed to the storage closet, opened it and dumped his armful of printer paper, pens and boxes of staples inside, then closed the door with a savage kick.

"What were you doing _out there_?" Bruce enquired mildly, throwing a stack of yellowed newspapers off a chair and sitting down.

"Ah," J smiled, obviously pleased with himself. "Stealing office supplies from my neighbour misteeer Reese. He locks his door when he goes out so he can't figure out how I do it. It's driving him craaay-zee!"

Bruce smiled behind his hand. "If you fall off the ledge and plummet twenty floors to the sidewalk, at least you'll die knowing that it was all in a noble cause."

"Eeexactly! I'm wondering if I can get him to snap and go on a killing spree before Christmas," J said brightly, leaning on the edge of his desk. "So, what can I do for yooou today Brucey?"

"I thought we should make plans for what we're going to do the weekend."

"Plans like which restaurant to go to? Or plans like which position to fuck in afterwards?" He raised an eyebrow. "Because, gotta say Bruce-o, I'm more into going with the flow on that second count. Not that I haven't been imagining certain... scenarios more than others, but I am still entertaining..." an elegant wave of one hand, "possibilities."

"Filthy degenerate," said Bruce, refusing to let himself look unsettled, since he suspected that that was what J wanted.

"Oh, like you haven't been thinking about it. Bet it hasn't even crossed your mind, hm?"

Bruce folded his arms across his chest and offered J a supercilious smirk. "What, your stupid promise? Not once."

"Liar," J stated. "_Any_-way... it _was_n't a promise, it was a statement of..." a pause to consider his next word, brief lick of his lips, "faaact."

"_Anyway_," Bruce aimed a chastening glare at the other man, "thoughts on restaurants?"

"Like I care." The scarred mouth quirked to one side and he seemed to immediately reconsider his position of indifference. "Ok, ok... what are the options?"

Bruce glanced upwards as he enumerated the eateries that immediately came to mind: "Amici... Café Rossi... Trois Garçons... Zen."

J made a childish face. "Oh, all those places are stupid. You couldn't get a decent gin martini in one of thooose joints even if you held a barman at gunpoint. Believe me – I've tried."

Bruce sighed, making a show of reluctance. "If you want... you can just come over to my place."

J clapped his wide-spread hand over his mouth, an exaggerated mime of surprise. "Yoooou... cook?"

"It's been known to happen."

"Bruce Wayne, playboy billionaire extra-ordinaaaire, wants to have little ol' meee over for an _in_timate dinner à deux? I'm literally... speechless–"

"And yet you're _still _talking."

"–why this may be the most genuinely rooo-mantic thing that's ever happened to me! I'm as giddy as a schoolgirl!"

"Just be there at eight-thirty." Bruce made to get up from the chair but a hand shot out and pushed him back.

The voice dropped by a few decibels, becoming scratchily intimate: "hey - you know what _else_ I've been thinking about since Friday?" J pushed himself away from the desk and stalked a circuit around the room, passing behind Bruce and making him feel like he was under police interrogation.

"I can't even imagine."

J stopped short just behind his left shoulder, and when he spoke his lips were close enough that Bruce could feel the rush of breath against his ear. "Thaaat... kiss."

"You have?" Bruce felt a smile tugging at the side of his mouth.

"Yeeeah," J straightened up – as much as he ever did, since his shoulders were habitually set at a forward cant. "I don't mind telling you, it was pretty... disappointing."

Bruce scowled at him. "What?"

"Disappointing," he repeated, as if the other man was hard of hearing. "I mean... you've obviously been... bottling _up_ all that... passion and... aaan-ger... for some time. Yet I finally give you that little... push! – that makes you act on it all – and what do you come up with?" J frowned and shook his head in the attitude of a teacher shaming an apt pupil for a poor performance. "Brief peck and... hasty re-treat." He gave Bruce a leveling look as he hitched a hip up onto the desk and leaned back against it. "Not very impressive. But then... that's you all over Brucey. You're... _impulsive_," he clenched his fists for emphasis, "but you don't... follow through."

Bruce paused for a moment, watching the smirking demon perched on the desk and closely evaluating him. "You want to know what I think?" he got to his feet and took a step forward, reaching out to brush a speck of lint from the lapel of J's striped waistcoat, then straightening his sky-blue tie with a deft twitch of one hand. He leaned in until his mouth was a bare inch from J's, then abruptly pulled back. "I think this is your way of asking me to do it again."

"Um-hmm," a slight tilting on his chin, a lowering of his lashes so his eyes became green-glittering slits. "Subtlety... was, uh, never my strong suit."

Bruce placed his hands on J's waist, feeling the jut of hipbones through the warm, creased linen of his trousers. If this had been a woman, Bruce would have said something moronic and charming as a prelude to swooping in, then his female partner would inevitably have melted in his arms, her lips parted and sweetly pliant. Yet all those years of experience now seemed useless, telling him nothing about how to approach J – that capricious, dangerous, _unknowable_ creature. Hot, ridiculous excitement coiled in his stomach at their proximity, and the knowledge of what he was about to do.

A second of hesitation – but then a surge forward, carried by the momentum of his own desire as sharply a s if a string had been pulled. His mouth made contact with J's and it was immediately _different_ to what he expected – he had thought J would clash with him, rise aggressively to meet him – but the other man was strangely passive, his lips soft beneath the chapped skin across their surface. Bruce was so surprised by this lack of resistance that he almost overbalanced and pushed them both backwards. Recovering his centre of gravity, Bruce pulled J closer, dragging the other man's frame up and against his own. One hand spanned the small of J's back, the other delicately tilted his chin so Bruce could change the angle of their mouths.

J was like a big floppy pierrot doll in his arms. Bruce had seen him do this odd display of surrender before – lying prone across a tabletop in a bar as he took a beating, laughs bubbling ceaselessly from deep in his chest, until his assailant grew bewildered and backed off, emasculated and disgusted by the perverse reaction to his assault. Bruce decided to demonstrate that was not to be so easily put off: he wound his tongue deeper into the lax mouth, then withdrew it and sucked the other's uncooperative muscle into his own; he wedged his thigh between both of J's and rocked against him. At this last action a reverberating groan rose from the other, a sound like victory to Bruce's ears.

Hands rose to cradle the billionaire's jaw as the doll finally came to life. J was now standing on his own feet, leaning less of his weight on Bruce but still flush up against him. He began to kiss back: slow and measured, somehow both thorough and teasing at the same time. Bruce closed his eyes and gave himself over to the sensations: the heat and solidness of the other's body, the glorious wetness of J's mouth and the flickers of that knowing tongue. He had fantasised about exactly this too many times not to lose himself in it; he didn't even care if J could feel him faintly trembling.

When J ended the kiss with a series of teasing licks and bites, Bruce turned his face to gain access to the long, curved scar that marred one of the other man's cheeks, gently searching its crenellations with the point of his tongue. In response J made a high, surprised sound that trailed into a groan; as if this was the sexiest and most startling thing anyone had ever done for him.

Without warning there came a hard push to Bruce's chest – completely unprepared, the billionaire stumbled blindly backwards until his shoulder hit the wall painfully, followed by his skull: two resounding thumps. In a split second J was on him, dragging him upright and attacking his mouth with doubled fervour. Bruce wrapped his arms around the other's broad back and spread his thighs to let J fit their hips together; then he moaned into J's mouth at the heat of a reassuring hardness pressing against his own through layers of cloth.

J gave him a final searching kiss before pulling back fractionally, trailing a hand down the billionaire's stomach and using his fingers to outline Bruce's cock where it lay up against his hip, provoking a helpless yelp of pleasure. "Hm," a thoughtful licking of his kiss-bitten lips. "Don't know if you're gonna laaast. Think I should give you something... to, uh, tiiide you over 'till the weekend."

"No, no..." Bruce murmured, suddenly remembering where he was: Wayne Towers, J's perilously unlocked office.

Another harsh rub against his crotch. "Funny, feels kinda like a_ yes_." A hand on his chest while the other fumbled at his flies, unzipping and finding their way inside. Roughened fingertips suddenly sliding over his shaft, causing him to twitch his hips and make a strange, needy sound. The fingers curled around him, tightening against his over-sensitized flesh; a thumb rubbed a circle over his slit, gathering the leaking precome.

In response to this last violating touch, Bruce bit down savagely on J's bottom lip and shoved him away in a burst of strength; J took a twisting step backwards and then fell gracelessly onto his behind. He sat there on the paper-strewn floor, laughing uproariously as Bruce hastily rearranged his clothes and pulled his zip back up. Locking his gaze with his employer's, he lifted his hand and showed the patch of glittering wetness on the pad of his thumb.

"When I was a kid... if you got to third baaase, you know, with a girl, we called this 'proof'." J raised the hand to his face sniffing like an animal and then sucking the digit clean and making a rumbling sound of satisfaction.

Bruce was so appalled he couldn't even speak. What was it with this man and bodily fluids?

J scrambled to his feet and moved towards his desk, throwing a look at Bruce over one shoulder. "Oh, don't look at me like thaaat. I've got so many... _worse_ things planned."

Bruce ran a hand back through his hair and took a deep, calming breath, aware that when he was infuriated or aroused he tended to blush a startling shade of red from his chest right up to his eyes. He did not want J, or anyone else in the office, to see him in such an obvious state of agitation. "Friday," he said, as if that one insistent word contained all meaning in the universe.

J threw himself into his office chair and mouthed it back at him, obediently scrawling on the back of his hand with a biro pen.

"And get yourself a new blackberry, for God's sake," Bruce added, pulling his remaining dignity about himself as he walked briskly to the door. With his hand on the doorknob he glanced back to see the other man propping his feet up on the desk, the undisputed lord of his shambolic office kingdom.

"Hey beautiful," J smirked, "wanna know a secret? I _do_ love it when you give in... but I love it even more when you... _push back_ a little."

On the way to his office, Bruce caught sight of his own reflection in one of the many plate glass windows: a red-faced, bright-eyed and tousel-haired thing stared back at him.

* * *

On Thursday Bruce called around to see his mother after he had finished his meetings for the day, telephoning ahead to check that she was not caught up in charity work. They went for a walk in the grounds of the manor, both wrapped up in overcoats and scarves against the cold of the late autumn.

"Did your father put you up to this?" she asked.

"What?" said Bruce, affecting innocence.

"Surprise visits. Not that I'm not always glad to see you, darling, but I can't help seeing Tom's hand in it somewhere."

"I guess he's just concerned, even though he knows he doesn't have a right to be. He wants you to be happy."

Martha looked toward the middle-distance, her eyebrows drawing downwards. "Yes, I believe that he does."

"You don't have to be nice about him all the time, you know."

Martha linked her arm with Bruce's and gave a soft smile, the lines around her eyes crinkling. "I don't have a bad word to say - he's irreproachable, your father." When they had walked on a few more steps she added, in a quieter voice: "I suppose that was part of the problem."

Bruce ducked as they passed beneath some over-hanging branches. She continued: "I was the one who asked for a divorce. He never told you that, did he?"

"No."

"He let you think that I was the wronged one. Because he's... noble, gentlemanly, like that." Her expression darkened. "Being married to your father was like being married to a saint. He... he does his duty by everyone. All people are the same, to be treated with equal respect. Nobody is... nobody is special to him." Her voice lowered until it was almost as if she was speaking to herself: "everything is for the higher cause, of course."

Bruce remained silent and thoughtful, just walking next to his mother and letting her lean on his arm.

"He has a girlfriend out in Africa, you know. A doctor with the Red Cross." She laughed humourlessly. "Another saint, no doubt."

"He told you?"

A wry smile. "Of course. Everything is above-board with your father. Besides... we're friends, you know. He insisted that we be friends." There was another interval of silence, Martha seemingly lost in her own thoughts. Eventually she offered, hesitantly: "Bruce, I have no right to tell you how to live your life, but if I could offer just one piece of advice I'd say don't... don't ever give yourself to someone who you feel no passion for, or who feels no passion for you. However... _friendly_ or respectful you are, it'll never be enough."

Bruce gave a tight smile and tried to lighten the tone: "so you advise me to have totally inappropriate, frivolous flings then?"

Martha laughed. "Yes, yes, the more inappropriate and frivolous the better!"

"I can definitely oblige you there."

"Hmm, you're being arch. Alright Bruce, who is she?"

"No-one."

"Bruce, it's obvious you're thinking of someone in particular. Go on, tell me."

Bruce sighed and rolled his eyes up to the darkening sky. "Imagine someone... the complete opposite of dad."


	3. Chapter 3

Bruce left Wayne Towers at four on Friday, heading to an upmarket grocery store and delicatessen to buy ingredients for dinner.

What to feed J? J – who was an uncompromising carnivore, of course – liked things he had to crack and pull apart with his hands. Crab, lobster and langoustines. And shrimp... he could rip off their heads and legs, unpeel their shells and happily eat those by the bucketload. Bruce approached the fish counter and watched the blue-grey live shrimp writhing in their overcrowded tank. No, he really didn't want a sinkful of those. He passed on to the meat counter and looked at the cuts on display. After consideration he selected fillet steaks of Wagyu beef – delicately marbled and absurdly expensive – then he wandered off towards the fruit and vegetables section, planning out the accompaniments in his head.

Dauphinoise potatoes, he thought... and some kind of vegetable side dish that J probably wouldn't eat anyway...

Oh, and he would have to stop by the pattiserie further along the block to buy a chocolate dessert – J _loved_ chocolate...

He returned to his penthouse and changed into a soft, worn pair of old jeans and a button-down shirt. In the kitchen he rolled up his sleeves, wrapped a white cotton garçon apron around his waist, poured himself a glass of wine and stared critically at his ingredients. Just as he reached for a knife he heard the soft chimes of his doorbell.

* * *

"Oh, oh _my_! Don't you look cute in that apron? Posi-tively good enough to... to _eat_."

"You're three hours early."

J held out a bottle of Louis Roederer Cristal, still in its gold cellophane wrapper. Bruce took it, frowned for a second then went to put it in the refrigerator. When he returned to the living area J had come in and closed the door and was in the middle of shrugging off a particularly vile checked jacket.

"You know, being early to dinner at someone's house is ruder than being late."

"Yeeaaah. About that... whole dinner arrangement... thing. See, I've been doing some thinking... I mean we _could_ do it the traditional way. We could... chit-chat and and make googly eyes at each other in the candlelight. We could do that," he nodded, his hands in his pockets. "But you knooow, the whole time we'd both just be thinking... 'damn, when are we finally gonna get this show on the road?'. So I figure it makes sense if we just... cut to the chase."

Bruce folded his arms across his chest and gave J a deeply unimpressed look. "Let me get this straight: you came over to my house to tell me that instead of having dinner like civilised people, you think we should just fuck and get it over with?"

"Oh, I've offended you haven't I? Geez, I know you're kind of ooold fashioned Brucey, you like a little mystery and ro-mance... but me, I'm all about... instant gratification."

"Yeah, I've noticed."

"You're kinda tetchy, aren't you?" J stepped closer and peered into Bruce's face. "How come? Is it because... it's not part of the plaaan? Hm?" an enquiring tilt of his head and a lick of his lips. "You thought you had it all figured out, right, but now it's going to play out differently? You know, you're a little... stiff-necked Bruce. Gotta learn to let go from time to time." A pair of arms slowly coiled around the billionaire's waist. "_That's_ what I've been trying to teach you – how to have some fun, rooooll with the punches..."

Bruce took stock of J's grinning satyr face and observed: "it's all a game to you."

"What?"

He shrugged within the circle of J's arms. "This. Me. Life in general."

J nodded and rolled his eyes thoughtfully. "'Everything is a game'... yeah, that's just... just about my philosophy, I guess." A falsely solicitous look came over his face. "But – oh Brucey, _darling_! – I don't want you to think because of that... that you don't _mean_ something to me." His cracked lips brushed against Bruce's ear: "because you... faaascinate me."

Bruce found that somehow hard to believe – that someone like J would find a privileged brat of interest. "Yeah? In what way?"

"You Bruce... you're all reee-pressed and puffed up with duty – right? But underneath it all there's this... this tantalising _hint_ of pure batshit crazy. I wanna... wanna... crack you open! Because I think maybe you're exactly like me – and I've never met _anyone_ like me." He gave a breathy laugh. "Before I met you I thought I must be an... ab-err-ation."

"You are."

J gave a low, gravelly chuckle. "But you like that, dontcha?I fascinate_ you_."

"There's certainly never been a dull moment since you came along."

As Bruce gazed at J he began to consider that he had never before thought to question what it was, exactly, that he found so irresistibly compelling about this man. Now, faced with the object of his desires, he was suddenly struck with the realisation of what a very strange and eerie person J was. Not just because of his scars and the bizarre clothing, or the way he talked, or his wild and unpredictable behaviour – but because he seemed to have no fixed, underlying personality. Yuppie, clown, thug – he played these oddball characters of his repertoire with aplomb, but none of them were really _him_. Their very conspicuous eccentricities were merely a means to distract people from the fact that the personas were all brittle and false.

Bruce longed to _know_ J, to pluck out the heart of his mystery – and yet he felt that to do so was entirely impossible. He imagined that if he pulled away one of J's masks he would find that there was nothing substantial beneath, just a swirling mass of impulses and ideas.

As he brushed the brassy curls back from J's forehead, he thought that looking into those eyes was like staring into something so frightening and intense that it could easily be mistaken for madness. This was someone who truly had no boundaries, no superego and only the most tenuous grip on everyday life. There was really no telling how far he would go, or already had done – who knew what felonies lurked in his obscure past? Yet Bruce had employed this dubious character at the risk of plunging his corporation into disrepute, then he had befriended him, actively seeking out his company.

Why?

Was J right? Was he simply responding to their underlying similarities; a kind of shared well of darkness and dysfunction? Or was it the opposite: was he attracted to J precisely because J was everything which he himself could never be – a free, amoral being?

J pulled him closer again, frowning at his hesitance. "You look kinda nervous Brucey. Something I said? Or is this... your first time? Been saving yourself for someone special like me, hm?"

Bruce blinked and put aside his reflections, summoning up his playboy smile. "No, but I don't think I've ever been with anyone... _exactly_ like you before."

"Yeah well... the world's a big place and there's only one of me to... go round." J leaned in and kissed him; a maddeningly soft, fleeting kiss that made his lips tingle. Bruce rested one hand on J's hip, the other at the small of his back. He watched as J pulled away, walking backwards towards the bedroom and beckoning with one hand, giggling as he almost tripped over his own feet. Another wave of surreality hit Bruce: he was starkly sober and outside it was failing daylight; now he would go into the bedroom and have premeditated sex with J.

He entered the bedroom to behold the sight of the blond haired man pulling his shirt off over his head. More scars, some silvered with age, some raw shiny-pink. Bruce stepped close and lightly ran his fingertips over the various gouges and welts as if he was reading hieroglyphs on a tomb wall, marveling at their reality; seared into flesh. Each one had an origin – a truth unknowable but transcendent of J's self-fictionalizing tales.

J turned and slipped within his arms to grab for the buttons of his shirt. Bruce reached back to untie the apron he had forgotten he was wearing. When he had shrugged out of the shirt J let out a low whistle, mapping the muscles of Bruce's chest with appreciative hands.

"Built, aren't cha?"

"Gym-built, I guess... not like you," Bruce ran his warm hands over J's broad shoulders, feeling the sinew and raw strength underlying the skin.

J's tawny eyelashes fluttered as he gazed down at Bruce's torso, a wry smile on his lips. "You're _peeer_-fect, you know? I never met anyone who was _perfect_ before..."

Only J could make the word 'perfect' sound disparaging. Bruce ignored the comment and leaned in to bring their mouths back together, their kisses growing hungry and sloppy as they caressed the expanses of revealed flesh. Too many clothes, Bruce thought, wishing there was a shortcut, some less awkward and frustrating way of achieving nakedness.

J sucked and bit at the side of his neck as he pulled at the fastenings of Bruce's jeans, muttering against his ear: "too much... anticipation. First time's gonna be hard and fast. Don't worry, we'll, uh, f_ix_ it later, in the second round."

J kicked off the clothing from his own bottom half and eased down onto the bed, leaning back on his hands, thighs spread, shamelessly displaying his aroused state. Bruce felt his mouth go dry as he gazed at the cock standing up and curving towards J's taut abdomen, the head flushed an aggressive red. He had done that to J; J felt that for _him_ – the thought was dizzying, somehow.

Bruce shrugged free of his own pooled jeans and approached the bed, reaching out to gently graze his knuckles over the head of J's cock, then lightly stroking and pulling at the shaft with one hand; a light, deft movement like kneading dough. Before he could take the teasing foreplay any further, the other man hissed and caught his wrist in a vise-like grip.

J drew down his eyebrows and gave Bruce his 'serious' expression as he asserted: "now, normally I'd fight you for the top, princess, but frankly I'm past caring about shit like that, I just need to get off _right now_... need _you_ to get me there, so, uh, just, just do whatever you want... _carte blanche_, kiddo."

J telling him to do _whatever he wanted_ – the attitude of insolent but complete surrender the words implied – _did something_ to Bruce, unleashing urges which were focused and primal, beyond all controlling. His friend the city prosecutor, Rachel Dawes, had once told him that the testimonies of people who committed crimes of passion were always that something their victim did or said just caused something in their minds to 'snap'. He remembered that his response to this justification had been skeptical; now, he perfectly understood.

Bruce grabbed J's shoulder and turned him, slamming him face-first down onto the mattress. In response J gave a lewd chuckle and raised himself onto his knees.

"Look at you go!" he enthused.

"Shut up." Bruce had given it all of two seconds of consideration before deciding that J had the world's most perfect ass – muscular, pale and rounded; almost feminine. He tried not to let it distract him, suppressing a groan as he mapped its contours with firms strokes of his hands. J's shoulders slumped and his front half seemed to melt into the bed at that; while his thighs spread open wider in encouragement. Bruce trailed his lips up the length of the other's spine, reaching for the bedside drawer.

His preparation of the other man with one and then two slickened fingers was perfunctory at best, but J did not seem to mind – on the contrary, he eagerly pushed back against the intrusion, making a whole host of weird grunts and moans. His head was turned to one side, a green eye visibly glinting.

Bruce rolled on a condom, his actions accomplished with the efficiency of desperation, and he groaned softly at even the light touching required to coat his sheathed shaft with lubricant.

J muttered something that sounded like an incitement, wriggling suggestively. Bruce took a breath and aligned himself, then slowly pushed in, feeling the give of J's body around him. He let out a gasp and J articulated a sound that might have been spelled out by someone hitting random buttons on a keyboard.

Bruce slipped an arm across the other man's chest and sat back so that he was kneeling, dragging J backwards with him. In response J groaned in a way that suggested that he was surprised and even more turned on, then squirmed back into Bruce's lap. J's head lolled back onto Bruce's shoulder and he let out a low rumbling sound into the billionaire's ear. "_Huh-unh_, might wanna move now. Just a suggestion."

Bruce felt J's tongue brushing against his cheek as it darted out when the other man licked reflexively at his scars. He thought about J's demanding attitude to it all and it annoyed him somehow ('_I'm all about... instant gratification_'). That strange urge re-asserted itself in Bruce to be someone dark and controlling. He touched J's chest, thumbs rubbing the hardened nipples, slipped his hands down to the other man's hips and began to very gently manipulate his shaft with the lightest of touches using one hand, while the fingers of the other began to lightly tickle the sensitive skin of the other's inner thighs, occasionally rising up to touch the underside of his sac with the faintest brush of his knuckles.

J made a helpless sound turning his head to lick and bite at Bruce's neck. "Come on, come on," he murmured, wriggling again. It was torture on himself too: Bruce's thighs trembled with the effort of keeping his hips still when J felt so tight and perfect around him. Some part of his brain was telling him that it would be worth it, that if he just drew this moment out it would elevate the experience from a good fuck to something mind-blowing. He petted J's chest and stomach soothingly, then slowly began to move.

Oh, sober sex was fucking _incredible_! He felt precarious and exposed, but the depth and preciseness of the sensations was making his eyes roll back in his head. When J reached down to touch himself as they rocked back and forth together, Bruce grasped both his wrists and held them down and away from his body, twisting J's shoulders in their sockets.

"No," he hissed in the other man's ear. It was going to be him – he would give J the pleasure that sent him over the edge.

"Fucking... sadist," J gritted out. Bruce smirked to himself and pushed him forward, a hand on the back of his neck. J obediently went down on all fours and they both moaned at the change in angle and pace with the shift allowed. Bruce grasped the other man's hips and let himself go, taking him with hard, savage thrusts, knowing that J wouldn't want him to hold back. A bare few minutes of this motion brought him to the point where he closed his eyes and tumbled helplessly into orgasm, a pull that began in his loins and stomach and spread outwards throughout every nerve and fibre in his body, pinpricks of light dancing behind his eyelids. He groaned low and softly, shuddering and burying his face in the other's neck.

Limbs still trembling, he pulled out slowly, letting J slump onto the mattress, then Bruce made his way unsteadily to the en suite bathroom to dispose of the condom and clean himself up. When he returned to the bedroom he found J had turned over and was now lying slumped against the headboard. He shot the young billionaire a look of distinct displeasure, having begun to touch himself again out of frustration. Bruce crossed to the bed and seized his wrist, grinding the tendons together to make J release his grip. "I said _no_. Lie back."

J gave a sly smile, clearly deciding to humour Bruce's dominant whim, arching his back as he eased his hips down the bed. Bruce lay down next to him on his side and lowered his head, licking a stripe up the underside of J's cock before taking it into his mouth and closing his fist around the base. Through that post-orgasmic leaden feeling which urged him towards sleep, he concentrated on maintaining the rhythm, bobbing his head and relaxing his throat, listening to the sounds which told him that J was getting closer to the edge as fingertips curled encouragingly in his hair and a thumb brushed against the shell of his ear. A thrill ran through him as he felt J's body tremble and arch upwards a moment before he finally tasted the other's release. Bruce stayed down, sucking him more gently until J went soft in his mouth.

When Bruce eventually sat up he found that J had his forearm flung over his eyes, his chest and stomach still expanding and contracting rapidly with deep breaths. Shivering a little, Bruce slipped under the covers and reached over to brush the backs of his fingers against J's cheek, a featherlight touch against the bumpy texture of the scars. J let his arm slip back to his side and the green eyes reappeared for a moment, along with a hint of a lazy smile, before his eyes closed again and the expression went slack.

They dozed together for a while in the twilight. Eventually Bruce was roused by movement on J's part: he heard his lover give a deep sigh of satisfaction, then felt him roll himself to the edge of the mattress.

Bruce watched as J rose naked from the bed and padded over to rifle through his discarded clothes. He came out with a gold cigarette case and matching zippo lighter. As he flipped out a hand-rolled cigarette and lit it, the green, cloying scent of cannabis bud filled the room.

J returned to the bed, climbing under the covers and lying diagonally across the mattress on his back, his head lowering to rest on Bruce's stomach. Bruce reached over to the nightstand and tipped a pair of cufflinks out of a silver trinket box, offering it to his companion for an ashtray, then lowering his freed hand to gently ruffle J's sweat-dampened curls.

J took a drag on the joint, in the quiet of the room Bruce could hear the sound of indrawn breath and the crackle of the paper burning down, then the heaved, steady sigh of exhalation, finally followed by a soft, contented groan. The billionaire smiled and rubbed a circle on his partner's bare chest with the flat of his hand. A blue-grey coil drifted ceilingwards from between the chapped, split lips. Bruce reflected that he had never before spent this long in J's presence without having to listen to him talk. He took the joint when J offered it, placing it between his own lips and letting the sweet, hot smoke fill his lungs.

Sooner than Bruce wanted it to be, the silence was broken: "gonna... _uh_... gonna sell my story to the tabloids in the morning. 'My Sex and Drugs Romp with Billionaire Bruce Wayne'."

Bruce laughed, expelling smoke through his nostrils. "Yeah, who's going to believe it?"

"Not sure I even do. Didn't know you could be baaaad, Brucey. I like it."

"Don't look so surprised – I went to college, you know."

"What didya experiment with _there_? Hm? Drugs or, uh-heh, _boys_?"

"Both, and some other things," Bruce blew a succession of three perfect smoke rings; J poked his finger through each one as they floated sluggishly upwards. "I kind of... went off the rails for a while. Flunked a year and had to repeat."

J's head lolled sideways and he gazed lazily at Bruce from beneath lowered lids. "Yeah? How come?"

"Don't know, lots of small reasons, I suppose. My parents got divorced when I turned eighteen. It was kind of like... they had waited, you know? I think they had been unhappy for a long time, but they just carried on... as if years of their lives didn't really mean anything because God forbid they should do something to damage _me_," he scowled briefly. "And... I thought getting into an ivy-league college would mean I'd be _challenged_, somehow... but classes were pointless and dull. I felt like the whole place was just a holding pen for moneyed brats too young and stupid to be trusted to do something with their lives. I don't know if it was some sort of 'existential crisis'... I guess I just felt like everything was total bullshit."

"Yeee-ah." J agreed as Bruce passed him the joint back, "that's because everything _is _total bullshit, honey-pie." He licked his lips. "So, how far did you... go? Hm? We talkin' a brief lapse or a full-on _de_-scent into, _uh_, meaningless hedonism?"

"Definitely the latter."

"Yeah? What brought you back – daddy give you a... a _stern_ talking to?"

"No... I had the decency to have my breakdown far away from home. My parents never really knew about it – all they knew was that I had had some 'difficulties'... I guess they assumed the problem was academic. I got myself out of it, in the end. I just reached a critical point where I saw that there were only two paths in front of me: one of them was a life like the one I had before – a return to my family and its values; the other was... I don't know – darkness, madness."

"Guess I don't need to ask what you chose." J's voice was faintly disgusted as he took another draw.

"I have this dream sometimes..." Bruce blinked and rubbed his eye against the smoke. "When, when I was a kid, maybe six years old.. I fell into this old cave on the estate. It was full of bats and I startled them. They all flew around me, swirling and swooping – millions of red eyes and flapping wings. It was like... being in the eye of a storm, I couldn't even tell which way was up. I mean, it really happened, but I can't help feeling somehow that it's just a metaphor, you know?"

"Metaphor for _what_, _Doc_-tor Freud?"

Bruce knew that the grass was making him sententious, but he went for it anyway: "the fear and chaos we all keep locked up inside us, because we're afraid to acknowledge it. I never went back to that cave in the grounds, but sometimes when I was on a trip or a comedown, I was _there_ again, I was falling back in and each time I never knew if I'd be able to claw my way back out again." He shrugged. "I don't want to know that part of me, I don't want to be stuck down there forever. 'When you stare into the void, the void stares back into you'."

"I figure," J said, warming to the subject, "something like that must have happened to me once. Some trauma or... maybe just a _reeeally_ bad day – who knows? But I must have faced that choice between sanity and insanity, like you did. I just... chose differently."

"But you're not insane."

He gave a wicked grin. "No, I'm something else, aren't I?" he licked his kiss-bitten lips. "I figure... you can be so logical that it becomes an obsession... a 'neurosis', riiight? Well, maybe you can also wade so far into madness that you... pop right out the other side! Kind of like a... a trial by fire or something."

Bruce thought about what it would be like to go down into that cave and stand there in the swirling mass of black, until the fear ebbed and calmness overtook him. Until he was no longer shrinking from the bats but wearing them as a cloak.

"You gotta break down to rebuild!" J was saying. "Come back better, faster, stronger!"

"Like the Six Million Dollar Man?"

"Yeah, that's what I'm talkin' about!' J clenched his fist. "I'm fuckin'... Steve Austin!"

Bruce started to laugh. Everything was suddenly very funny: bats and Princeton and J running in slow motion in a red tracksuit. Laughter bubbled up inside him, causing his stomach to shake and so dislodging the other man from his comfortable position. J heaved a great sigh and sat up, running his hands back through his tangled hair. When Bruce held out the remaining half of the joint, he looked at it thoughtfully.

"I reeeeally shouldn't have any more of that," he said, sounding like a woman reluctantly turning down a secretly-desired second slice of cake.

"Why, are you a lightweight?"

"Nah... just makes me un-controoolably horny."

"Is that so?" Bruce took a deep drag and leaned forward, sealing his lips over J's and exhaling into his mouth, J inhaled deeply in response, leaning into him and avidly stealing his smoke-laden breath. When they both sat back, their mouths separating, J pressed the back of his hand to his own forehead in a mock-swoon.

"Ooooh, you're _such_ a bad influence on me."

Bruce stubbed out the joint and set the makeshift ashtray back on the nightstand, then rolled towards the centre of the bed, tugging J down to lie by his side. He brushed the curls back off J's forehead and kissed him, in response the other made a drowsy sound of pleasure which made desire stir again within Bruce's body.

Bruce let his eyes fall closed as they indulged in lazy kisses, his thumbs brushing his lover's scars again, still intrigued by their texture. J's hand wandered from his chest down to his knee, fingertips slipping around to the inside of the joint and tugging it towards him, so that Bruce's uppermost leg slipped over the his waist. Fingertips began to draw intricate patterns on the sensitive flesh of the billionaire's inner thigh. Bruce's hands firmly traced the curved length of J's spine and he broke their kiss to bite and suck on the flesh of the other's neck, salty where the sheen of perspiration had dried.

They shifted together as J reached over him to scrabble on the nightstand. Bruce's eyes flew open when he felt slick fingertips rubbing at his entrance, sending electric tingles through his body. J was looking at him speculatively; and when he did not react or pull away, two fingers pushed inside. Bruce grunted in discomfort at the initial intrusion, kissing J's throat to distract himself until his body adjusted. He always thought that it was a vaguely unsettling feeling, an oddly _intimate_ thing to let someone do...

He suddenly let out a heaved, stuttering breath against J's mouth as the fingertips brushed against his prostate. It was almost too much, too blindingly pleasurable. He had never thought of cannabis as a sex drug before, but its effects were making every touch, no matter how slight, seem lingering and profoundly intense.

"You don't mind?" J seemed mildly surprised by Bruce's lack of prudish resistance.

"No..." Bruce gave another pleasured gasp when J began to twist his fingers each time he withdrew, "_fuck_... you can do _that_ for about a week."

J smirked and pushed his fingers in deeper. "M-mm, maybe you're not as up-_tight_ as I thought..."

Bruce slipped a hand between them to grasp J's cock, which was lying warm and lazy against Bruce's inner thigh, teasing it to full hardness by squeezing it within the cage of his fingers and rubbing his thumb over the head. He loved the feeling of it swelling, expanding within his grip. They kissed again, J's stubble sharp against his lips as they misjudged the angle. As J became more aroused in his hand, Bruce, perversely, touched him ever less decisively, wanting to frustrate him. J grunted against his lips at the teasing and in retaliation completely withdrew his fingers. Bruce heard himself make a soft, urgent sound of disappointment.

"Oh, make_ thaaat _noise again..." J mimicked it and then let out an uncomfortably loud bark of laughter.

Bruce wondered what was the best way to provoke J further, settling on a lewd challenge, whispered against the shell of the other's ear: "why don't you just stop screwing around and fuck me already?" He almost laughed at his own words; he felt like he was back in college, playing at being a libertine.

J's green eyes lit up and he grinned wolfishly, shoving Bruce onto his back, then rolling him onto his other side and playfully slapping his flank. "Mmm... demanding," he commented, reaching across the other man again for a condom.

Bruce lay utterly still, taking in the outline of his own fingers atop the covers, the texture of the cotton pillowcase beneath his cheek, the moonlight casting everything in shades of monochrome. Behind him he was intensely aware of the heat radiating from J's bare skin, burning him with its almost-touch.

It seemed to take forever for J to prepare himself, then Bruce remembered that it was the drug again, making time seem turgid and slow. Finally J's hands were on him again, an arm slipping beneath his neck, a hand on his hip tugging him back against J's chest. He lay at an angle now, propped against the other's body; it made him feel curiously unbalanced. J nuzzled him, lightly nipping at the skin behind his ear and bathing his neck in hot breath. The hand slipped back beneath his knee then slid upwards, insistently elevating his thigh, J's fingertips with their almond-shaped nails scratching lightly. Then he felt the shifting of the mattress beneath him and the muscles of the other's chest and abdomen tautening against his back as J positioned himself. Bruce tried not to tense up in anticipation, to stay relaxed and receptive and ignore the fluttery, spinning sensation in his stomach that was making him feel faintly delirious (another effect of the drug, he told himself).

"Tell me, how looong have you," a pause and the sound of swallowing, "wanted this?"

Bruce let out a shaky breath, he felt certain that he was going mad: his skin burned wherever J touched it and felt cold and bereft wherever he did not. "Since... _fuck_, since the first time you broke into my office." This was, strictly-speaking, a lie, but he suspected that it was exactly what J wanted to hear.

J's voice became infuriatingly bright: "gooood, good." He wriggled downwards, the tip of his cock brushing against Bruce's entrance with just not-quite-enough force to penetrate. Bruce made the disappointed sound again and J chuckled low against his ear, then shifted his hips again and _pushed_. There was a flickering moment of uncertainty where it seemed like it wasn't going to _work_, somehow, but then J did something insistent with his hips and everything slid into place; they both moaned, startlingly loud in contrast to the silence of the room. There was a torturous pause until – as if responding to some internal cue – J suddenly began to move.

Bruce shifted in his arms, trying to get comfortable in a position which rendered him utterly passive. He wasn't at all used to feeling out of control and vulnerable; having to depend on J's torso against his back and arm hooked beneath the knee joint of his uppermost leg for support as he tried to maintain his balance. In the end he just stopped trying, relying on his lover's strength and instincts. He closed his eyes and let J rock them both in a slow, languid rhythm, listening to the creaking of the mattress, the grunts and quietly-hissed obscenities.

In the intimacy of the dark, everything was drawn out, time unknowable. Bruce wondered idly how long they had been at it: maybe it was a few minutes, maybe half an hour... he didn't know or care. He could feel J's mouth open over his neck, the pressure of both sets of sharp eyeteeth digging into his skin as the other man let out a low, rumbling noise that was almost a growl – it was like mating with a barbary lion, Bruce thought to himself distractedly, suddenly trying very hard not to succumb to another fit of delirious laughter.

When the jaw spanning the side of his neck unlocked and lifted he felt the circling of a wet point of a tongue drawing circles over the indentations left behind. J raised himself on his elbow, snapping his hips faster, deeper; Bruce forgot how to open his eyes, to think, as he refocused on the point of pleasure where their bodies joined and separated, the relentless slide in and out of his body – and _god_ why hadn't he remembered how good that felt – why had he even bothered with women? Maybe it had never felt like this before, maybe it was just because it was _his_ cock; _him_ everywhere, encircling him, penetrating him; _his_ skin and sweat, hair and breath and voice. Bruce's hand brushed over his own shaft, lying taut and heavy against his belly. He moaned, so turned on, wondering if just J inside him, stimulating that sweet spot so relentlessly, would be enough or if he should...

"Yeah, touch yourself..." J urged, "I wanna, wanna see it."

Bruce did, trying to take it slowly, but finding that his hand sped up of its own accord, until it was mirroring J's rhythm.

"Yeah, yeeeah, that's so... _fuck –_ Bruce, do you know how fucking sexy you are?"

What was he supposed to say to that? He didn't say anything, he just moaned again, suddenly much closer to orgasm; he could feel it within his reach, almost – that would take only the slightest push and he would tumble in. J sounded pretty far gone too, only able to articulate combinations of the monosyllables 'yeah', 'fuck' and 'Bruce'.

"So close..." Bruce huffed out, his voice so strained it was almost a sob as hand worked his shaft feverishly.

In response J bit down on his shoulder and worked his hips faster, the erratic, desperate cadence of his thrusts signaling that he too was on the home straight. Bruce beat him by a bare few seconds, his vision blacking out around the edges as he spiraled into orgasm, shuddering and bucking back the other's pelvis, hot, slippery-textured semen coating his fingers and stomach. J made a sound like someone over-acting a dying groan and flipped Bruce onto his front, overstimulating the other man's jangling nerve endings in a way which was either blindingly pleasurable or painful – sensations all having become fuzzy and indistinct for Bruce in the aftermath of his orgasm. J thrust in deeply a final time, twitching and surging, then let out a soft, fervent groan and sagged against Bruce's immobile form.

After a moment where Bruce thought he might possibly have lost consciousness, J cautiously withdrew and flopped onto his back. There followed a twilight period of some minutes where they both sprawled immobile and panting. Bruce rolled onto his side and lay with his knees up close to his chest, thinking that he should get up and wash, but feeling totally disinclined to move since his limbs all felt leaden and weighted down. His skin was flushed with a warm, pervasive glow and yet he shivered, wanting body heat and blankets – things which he was also forced to regard as unobtainable, requiring, as they did, coordinated movement on his part.

J moved first: Bruce heard the sound of feet hitting the floor and J's stumbling gait moving off to the bathroom. A minute later a damp washcloth hit Bruce in the face. He gave a grunt of displeasure and rolled onto his back to clean off his stomach. He supposed this was probably J's idea of being a considerate lover.

J bounced back onto the bed and tugged the kicked-back covers around them. The billionaire reached over, blindly searching for the other's hand; when he finally grasped it he entwined their fingers – not feeling sentimental, just requiring a point of re-connection after having been so caught up in the other's body. He was drifting toward sleep when J spoke again, offering an observation:

"Always knew you'd be good in the sack." Bruce heard the sound of the other man licking his lips and swallowing, "The uptight ones always are... all that repressed angeeer, I guess."

"By that logic, _you_ should be terrible in bed. You never repress anything."

J ignored the wise-crack, adding conversationally: "Gotta say... you surprised me just now."

"Yeah?" Bruce finally managed to turn his head to look at the man lying next to him.

"Thought you'd be this _domineering_ power top, you know?"

"Why?" Bruce licked his own dry lips, "because I think 'I'm the boss'?"

"Yeah, that. And you're kinda... tight-_lee_ wound. Thought you'd put up a little... resistance to my, uh, _advances_ just now..."

"Are you disappointed that I didn't?"

"Well, maybe I had fantasies which involved a little... coercion."

"Coercion?"

"Per-suasion, let's say..."

Bruce laughed, still breathless and a little light-headed. "You wanted me to struggle and say 'no'?"

"Mighta been fun." J's eyes slid sideways, catlike. "I like a challenge."

"Are you trying to say I'm 'easy'?"

"Oh, that's common knowledge. You're a slut, Wayne."

"How do you figure that?"

"Well... you're so hot for some, uh, _action_ that you skip dinner and... cut right to it!" He drew down his eyebrows in a mock-serious expression: "lax, I call it."

Bruce smirked and looked over at the clock, surprised to find that only two hours had passed since J's arrival. "I did promise you dinner, didn't I?"

* * *

They got up and showered together. Bruce closed his eyes beneath the hot spray of water and let it wash away the remnants of the stupor induced by the drug as J's soapy hands slipped over his chest.

After they had dried off and dressed, Bruce went to start preparing dinner. J followed him and announced his intention of 'helping', although it turned out that his notion of what this entailed was to sit on the countertop, make himself gin-based cocktails and eat pimento-stuffed olives out of a jar.

When the meal was ready, J ate ravenously enough to satisfy Bruce's wondering over whether or not he liked it. Bruce tried to remind himself that they had had dinner together at least twenty times before, that the situation shouldn't feel weird. There was no reason for him to feel awkward when their knees brushed under the table.

As he returned to the kitchen to put the plates in the dishwasher, he heard the sound of a cry of triumph echoing through the penthouse. He looked out into the living room to see that J had opened the sliding doors to the balcony and discovered the hot tub. He watched the other man rolling back the slatted cover and then starting to throw off his clothes in the night air.

Bruce smiled and shook his head absently, then ducked back into the kitchen to collect the wine that J had brought and a pair of champagne flutes.

J smirked up and him as he slipped naked into the steaming, churning water. "Soooo, player – how many people can you get in here?"

"Fourteen is the record. It was kind of a tight fit, though." Bruce set down the bottle and glasses by the water's edge, then began removing his own clothes, intensely aware of J's gaze.

"Naked?"

Bruce laughed. "Bikinis."

An eyebrow cocked. "You included?"

"If that's what you want to imagine." Bruce slipped into the water and turned to open the champagne. He eased the cork from the bottleneck skillfully, so it made a soft sigh rather than a pop, then poured them each a glass and proffered one to J.

Bruce held up his glass and contemplated the pale gold, effervescent liquid. "I've never actually had Cristal before."

"No? How come?"

Bruce wrinkled his nose faintly. "I suppose because it's flashy and... _parvenu_."

J stuck the tip of his tongue out between his teeth. "So am I... what's your point?"

"Nothing... it's a good vintage." Bruce raised his glass. "So, you want to propose a toast?"

"To what? To, uh, absent friends? Your very good health? A maaaagical evening?"

"Whatever you want."

"To us?"

Bruce smiled, the playboy smile again, and dipped his gaze, inclining his glass so that it clinked softly against J's. J drank down half the flute's contents in one go and leaned in to give Bruce a lingering kiss that tasted of five hundred dollar champagne.

They lounged in the water until the wine was finished, their laughter spiraling upwards like the steam from the water's surface and drifting off into the stark night air. When J set his empty glass down by the tub's edge, his attention became drawn to the balcony itself.

"I bet you get a great view from up here."

Bruce watched him as he pulled away, leaning back and half swimming across the pool until he reached the other side and pulled himself up onto the decking. He padded across to the railing, his skin almost luminous and the moonlight bleaching out his scars. Bruce looked after him admiringly: he had the vitality and musculature of a figure from a Blake etching.

After a moment of observation, Bruce crossed the small pool and pulled himself out to join the other man in staring out at Gotham as it was laid out below.

"From this height we could spit on the entire city," J commented, leaning over and gesturing towards the lights of the streets forty floors below.

Bruce gave him an amused look, leaning on the balcony rail. "Why would we want to?"

J folded an arm across his shoulders and pulled the billionaire closer to himself. "Because, Bruce-o, you and me _own_ this two-bit town."

Bruce reached up and took the strange, scarred face in his hands and felt J lean into him. He was no closer to understanding this apparently rootless man who had effectively hijacked his life, but he was becoming more and more enraptured with the mystery.


End file.
